Supreme Court Agrees to Hear BCCI Petition on N. Srinivasan But No Date Fixed
The BCCI is seeking legal clarity from Supreme Court on whether N. Srinivasan can attend its meetings. Last month, the Board was forced to cancel its important working committee meeting after N. Srinivasan was adamant on attending it.
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear Board of Control for Cricket in India's petition seeking clarification on whether former BCCI president N. Srinivasan can attend its meetings.
Senior advocate K.K. Venugopal, appearing for BCCI on Friday, mentioned the plea and sought an urgent hearing for judicial clarification on the entire issue. However, the Supreme Court bench, headed by Justice T S Thakur, said that it will hear the application in the near future but did not fix a date for hearing. Any delay will only delay the BCCI AGM which will once again not be held on time (by end-September).
On September 12, the BCCI had asked the Supreme Court if Srinivasan could attend its meetings as the president of Tamil Nadu Cricket Association. The Board's legal team feels Srinivasan still has "conflict of interest" issues and as per court directive, cannot attend BCCI meetings.
Last month, the Board was forced to call off its crucial working committee meeting in Kolkata which was to discuss the fate of Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals in Indian Premier League.
The BCCI called off its working committee meeting in Kolkata on August 28 'sine die' after Srinivasan was adamant on attending as a representative of TNCA. The BCCI said there was no 'no legal clarity' on whether the former BCCI chief could be part of its meetings.
The BCCI is wary because there is no clarity on how Srinivasan's company India Cements has sold off its stakes in CSK. The Supreme Court had barred Srinivasan from attending BCCI meetings as long as he had stakes in the Chennai IPL team.
Srinivasan though has clarified his position and said that he does not have any shares in CSK. This after India Cements Ltd in its board meeting decided to demerge the franchise CSK from ICL (India Cements Ltd) and form a new company called Chennai Super Kings Cricketers Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of ICL.
BCCI though feels there is a lot of ambiguity on the matter and has therefore asked Supreme Court to either shed light on the issue or send it to Justice Lodha Panel - the three-member committee that slapped a two-year suspension on CSK and RR due to its officials being involved in betting during IPL 2013.
(With inputs from A Vaidyanathan)